ALLENDALE -- With one of its team leaders out because she was attending her grandmother’s funeral, the Grand Valley State women’s basketball team played inspired basketball Monday night.

Junior center Alex Stelfox was back home in Maryland with family dealing with the passing of her grandmother Saturday, but the Lakers received strong efforts from players up and down their roster in her absence, which helped Grand Valley State to an 85-45 win against visiting Urbana.

"We are here for Alex, and we knew she had to go back to Maryland, so we knew we had to step up our game with her gone," Taylor said. "She can spend as much time in Maryland as she needs, we all know family comes first here. And I thought we played great tonight."

Other than a slow start that saw the Lakers (2-2) held scoreless through the first few minutes of the game, it was a solid effort according to coach Janel Burgess, even without the strong presence of Stelfox in the middle.

"We had an average performance at Wisconsin-Parkside (a 73-60 loss Saturday), and it didn’t matter who was on the court tonight, they needed to do what they are expected to do," Burgess said. "That is to play with discipline and play with a consistent level of heart. We did that."

And that showed in the stats.

In the first half, Grand Valley State held the Blue Knights to 36.7 percent shooting from the field, while shooting 48.8 percent itself in building a 50-30 lead at the break.

The Lakers continued to put the defensive pressure on Urbana in the second half, holding the Blue Knights (1-5) scoreless for six minutes midway through the second half, which allowed the Lakers to go on a 15-0 run and put the game away and had Burgess clearing her bench.

"We started out slow, but we never went back to that (level of play) during the rest of the game," Burgess said. "They played with energy tonight, and we need to continue to do that moving forward."